Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Vanderbank, Peter
VANDERBANK or VANDREBANC, PETER (1649–1697), engraver, was born in Paris in 1649, and studied his art there under Nicolas Poilly. About 1674 he accompanied Henri Gascar [q. v.] to England, and gained a reputation as an engraver of portraits, which he executed on a larger scale than any previously produced in this country. He worked with great mechanical skill, but his plates are deficient in the higher qualities of the art. They include portraits of Charles II, James II, Mary Beatrix, the Prince and Princess of Orange, Louis XIV, the Duke of Monmouth, Sir William Temple, Sir E. Berry Godfrey, and other prominent persons, chiefly from pictures by Lely, Kneller, and Gascar; also a ‘Holy Family’ and ‘Christ on the Mount of Olives,’ after S. Bourdon, and three plates from Verrio's ceilings at Windsor. Vanderbank engraved, from drawings by Lutterell, the earlier portraits in Kennett's ‘History of England.’ On his prints his name is always spelt ‘Vandrebanc.’ He received very inadequate remuneration for his work, and at the end of life was in reduced circumstances. He died in 1697 at Bradfield, Hertfordshire, the residence of John Forester, whose sister he had married, and was buried on 4 Oct. in the church of Cottered-cum-Bradfield. After his death his widow sold his plates to Abraham Browne, a print-dealer, to whom they proved a source of great profit. A mezzotint by George White, inscribed ‘Peter Vanderbank, engraver,’ has been assumed to be a portrait of him, and copied by A. W. Warren for the 1849 edition of Walpole's ‘Anecdotes;’ but the costume is of a somewhat later date, and it may possibly represent one of his sons, who is said to have practised engraving, though his works are not known. He appears to have had four other sons, one of whom, John Vanderbank [q. v.], is separately noticed.
[Walpole's Anecdotes of Painting; Strutt's Dict. of Engravers; J. Chaloner Smith's British Mezzotinto Portraits; Vertue's Collections in British Museum (Addit. MS. 23073, f. 15); Cottered parish register.]Dictionary of National Biography, Errata (1904), p.269
N.B.— f.e. stands for from end and l.l. for last line
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| 100 | ii | 9 f.e. | Vanderbank, Peter: for Brown read Abraham Browne |